Disaster Preparedness for Family Caregivers Webinar

Main Content

Webinar held on April 16, 2014. Co-sponsored by HHS Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response and HHS Administration for Community Living.

Overview

This webinar provides information for those who assist family caregivers in planning for emergencies and disasters. It includes guidance and examples for informing family caregivers on keeping themselves and their loved ones safe in a disaster or emergency by developing personal preparedness plans. The video includes a brief introduction to preparedness planning for family caregivers and the role of HHS in supporting at-risk individuals and family caregivers. Subject-matter experts (SMEs) provide presentations that described the role of caregiving across the lifespan including:

Lessons Learned from Hurricane Sandy: Challenges of Sheltering in Place for Parents of Children with Developmental Disabilities or Special Health Care Needs including Autism

Supporting Older Americans who are Medically Fragile

Lessons Learned from 9/11, Katrina, and Sandy for Persons with Dementia and Alzheimer’s Disease

The webinar covers crosscutting issues for family caregiver preparedness including key considerations for family members in creating a preparedness plans, connecting to community resources, advocating for family members needs and interests, participating in community planning activities, creating opportunities for whole community engagement, building community resilience, and initiating relationships and partnerships in advance of an emergency or disaster.

Disaster Preparedness Coloring Book: This coloring book is designed for adults and children to work together to learn about fire, earthquakes, floods, tornados and other disasters, as well as how to protect themselves all while having fun coloring.

U.S. Department of Homeland Security

Ready.gov (2013): Portion of DHS's interactive site that is for parents and teachers to help prepare kids for a disaster.

The American Red Cross

Masters of Disaster Preparedness Education (2013) : The American Red Cross Masters of Disaster curriculum is centered on a series of ready-to-go lesson plans that help both organizations and parents educate children about important disaster safety and preparedness information.

Helping Children Cope with Disaster (2004): This booklet offers parents, caregivers, and other adults suggestions on how to help children cope with the effects of disaster, as well as how to be prepared before a disaster strikes.

Disability

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR)

Disability.gov (2013): Disability.gov is the federal government website for comprehensive information on disability programs and services in communities nationwide. The site links to more than 14,000 resources from federal, state and local government agencies; academic institutions; and nonprofit organizations. You can find answers to questions about everything from Social Security benefits to employment to affordable and accessible housing.

National Weather Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Weather Radio All Hazards

NWR for Deaf and Hard of Hearing (2011): The material provided in this document is general information on how you can use NOAA Weather Radio (NWR) as an alerting tool for the deaf and hard of hearing. This is not an all-inclusive listing of how the system can be used, what products are available or an endorsement of any product listed here.

Older Adults

HHS Administration on Aging

Just in Case: Emergency Readiness for Older Adults and Caregivers: This fact sheet provides step-by-step information on how older adults should prepare for a disaster/emergency. It includes helpful checklists, contact lists, and a medication list that can be filled in.

Emergency Resources for Other Languages (2011): This webpage contains flyers, brochures, tri-folds, press releases and public service announcements tailored to provide disaster preparedness, response, recovery and mitigation information. The purpose of these webpages is to help people with limited English proficiency levels to receive important life-sustaining and life-saving information when disasters strike.

National Language Service Corps

Translation services (2013) : The NLSC is a readily available group of language volunteers who provide supplemental language resources to U.S. federal agencies.

Healthy Roads Media

Translated Material: Emergencies (2012) : This site contains health education materials in a number of languages and a variety of formats. They are being developed to provide health information for diverse populations in a variety of settings.

Safe Drug Use After a Natural Disaster (2013): The Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER) at FDA offers the following information on the use of drugs that have been potentially affected by fire, flooding or unsafe water, and the use of temperature-sensitive drug products when refrigeration is temporarily unavailable.